Jokes of the Unconscious

This excellent graphic novel is a collection of shorts that tells the story of a young woman working at a hospital insurance job which her physician father obtained for her before he died of cancer—in that same hospital. Sasha is young, gay, opinionated and has a death-inflected sense of humor that's equal parts cringe and belly-laugh. Gottleib's protagonist tends to hilarity amid deep despondence and even the side characters have dimension and show serious attitude on the page. The art is a bit clumsy, but DiMassa's images—Sasha straddling a crocodile to tell a joke, turning into a blank-eyed hermaphroditic space alien to show how numb she is or slipping a tiki idol a drag from her cigarette—are so imaginative that it doesn't matter. The book includes adult content, including lesbian sex, but the nudity tends more toward old men in nursing homes exposing themselves by accident. The story scatters a bit at the end, but it's a sad yet deeply funny book that moves from gross to subtle in a heartbeat. (Sept.)